Cayd looked her over as she quietly ate, he could practically see the anger radiate off her body in waves. “Can I pick you up after work?” he asked, changing the subject.
“I’d like that,” she said, rising from her stool and lifting her plate.
“Leave that, I’ll do it,” Cayd told her, causing her to remove her fingers from the edges of the plate.
“Thank you,” she said, leaning in to kiss him. He wrapped his arms around her slender waist and pulled her tightly against him, kissing her fervently.
Humming he pulled away and ran his fingers through her wavy hair. “Can you wear it up today?” he asked.
“Do you prefer it that way?”
“No, I adore it down. But I want to watch you take it down tonight.”
“Will I be staying with you tonight?” she asked, hopefully, feeling that the time spent apart while at work would feel like torture enough.
“I hope so. I think I’d like you with me every night. I’m not sure I could sleep without you now that I’ve had a taste,” he said, kissing her neck before nipping lightly at her ear lobe.
Humming pleasantly herself, she pushed herself away from him. “I have to go so I can change before work,” she sighed, not wanting to leave.
“Of course, what time shall I collect you?” he asked.
“Meet me at my place at five?”
Cayd nodded and rose to stick his feet in his shoes.
“Where’re you going?” she asked,
“I’m going to walk you to your car,” he answered.
Smiling, Mia picked up her handbag, happily leaning into him as he slid his arm around her waist and walked with her up the pathway next to his house.
Leaning against her car, Cayd placed his hands either side of her and kissed her once more while she dug in her bag for her keys.
“Oh no, my keys must still be inside,” she said.
“It’s ok, I know where they are. Wait here,” he said, jogging back inside.
Mia’s face was plastered with a huge smile that wouldn’t go away as she watched him disappear around the side of the house, her attention was then drawn to the parking lot as Evelyn’s car pulled into her space.
“Oh you changed your hair!” she exclaimed as she climbed out of her car and walked towards Mia. “Do we have another session today?” she asked, not recalling setting up a new appointment after yesterday.
“Um, no, why would we have a session?” Mia asked, thoroughly confused.
Realisation dawned on Evelyn’s face at the same moment Cayd returned with Mia’s keys.
Cayd froze as he saw the two women together and noted the confused look Mia’s face and the guilty look on Evelyn’s.
“Natalie’s a patient here?” Mia asked, her head starting to throb as the thought that she had been played all along hit her.
“Oh god, I’m so sorry,” Evelyn stammered, looking at Cayd and backing away. “I didn’t realise you were dating her.”
“Evelyn, just go inside please,” Cayd said calmly, his eyes on Mia as he observed Evelyn’s retreat in his periphery.
“You knew her before you knew me?” she asked incredulously.
“It’s not like that Mia. Come back inside, I can explain.”
“No, I need to go. I need to think,” she mumbled, her brow knitted tightly as she reached out to take her keys from Cayd’s grip, entering a slight tug of war when he refused to let go.
“Talk to me Mia,” he pleaded.
“I trusted you Cayd! Through all of this I trusted you! And you’ve been lying to me all along. How could you know about her and not tell me straight away? And what was that whole thing with the PI? Oh my God – I don’t know what to think anymore!” she rambled, tears stinging the backs of her eyes. “Please let go,” she breathed, tugging at the keys, her eyes closed as she refused to look at him. “I need to get to work.”
“Alright,” he said, releasing her keys. “But don’t think this changes anything between us Mia.”
Mia didn’t respond, she simply got into her car and drove off, her mind reeling. What the fuck was going on?
***
“Have you spoken to her yet?” Natalie asked in a rush of breath the moment she heard Cayd’s voice on the other end of the phone call, her nerves causing her to forget her manners.
“I have Natalie, and at the moment, she doesn’t want to talk to you,” he told her calmly.
“Will you keep trying?” she pleaded, wanting to somehow set things right after everything she had done.
“I don’t know Natalie. That’s not why I called you. She found out this morning that you’re a patient here.”
Natalie almost dropped the phone as she heard his words, gripping her fingers tighter to keep it to her ear. “What do you mean? How? That’s private information!” she rambled.
“She ran into Evelyn this morning and well, she got mistaken for you.”
“But she has red hair now! How the hell did that happen?”
“I don’t know. I only came in at the end of their interaction – but Natalie, she thinks I knew about you the whole time and that I was somehow in on all of it. I can’t explain it to her without you,” he said simply.
“So she’s pissed at both of us right now and you want to ambush her together?”
“That’s not quite how I’d put it, but I suppose so, yeah.”
“Why are you asking me to do this Cayd? I thought she didn’t want to see me.”
“I’m obviously grasping at straws Natalie. She thinks I’ve betrayed her and you can set her straight.”
“I’ll do it Cayd. I don’t know that she’ll listen to me either. But I’m willing to try. Where do you want to meet?”
“At her flat, 5pm this evening. Wait for me outside,” he instructed before disconnecting the call and wondering if he should call Mia again. He didn’t want to seem overbearing as he’d already called her twice with no answer. But he was worried, the longer she had to think on everything without knowing the truth – the worse her mind could make it.
He didn’t want to risk losing her and decided to call again and if she didn’t answer, this time he’d leave a message.
Holding his phone to his ear he waited as the connection rang, growing nervous as it continued unanswered.
“Hi, you’ve reached the voicemail of Mia Smyth. I’m unavailable at the moment. Please leave a message along with your number and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can,” said her voicemail recording.
“Mia, please call me back. You’ve got it all wrong, please talk to me,” sighing down the line, he didn’t know what else to say. “I’ll see you tonight,” he finished simply, punching the screen with his thumb and dropping his phone onto his kitchen counter as he wondered if Natalie’s secrets were going to ruin everyone’s relationships.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Natalie was already waiting for Cayd outside Mia’s block of flats when he pulled up and parked his Mercedes on the street. She had arrived almost ten minutes early, not wanting to keep him waiting when he seemed to be the only one willing to offer even a tiny bit of help to her.
He nodded at her in greeting as he crossed the road and slid his wayfarers on top of his head, “You ready?”
“To get shot down? Definitely,” she replied in an attempted joke that Cayd didn’t really find funny.
He led the way up to Mia’s flat and tapped on the door, waiting with his hands on his hips before rapping again, this time much firmer.
“I don’t think she’s home,” Natalie commented.
“Shit,” he muttered under his breath, knocking once more for good measure.
“I still have a key,” Natalie offered.
“No you don’t,” he told her. “I had the locks changed for her… damn it!” he growled, booting the base of the door with his foot. “I need to talk to Louise. She’ll know where she is,” he said pulling out his phone and scrolling through his contacts. He’d gotten Louise’s number off her on the day the
y were waiting to confront Natalie.
“You’re calling her? You do know she’s deaf right? Why does she even have a phone?”
Cayd’s brow furrowed as he gave Natalie a disbelieving look. “Yes, but she’s not blind as well – she can read text and see a video call.”
“Oh… of course she can, sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it – I just didn’t understand…”
Cayd walked out of the building and into the daylight so Louise would be able to see him better before he called, closely followed by Natalie.
“Hello,” Louise answered, her image pixelating slightly on the screen as the connection took hold.
“Louise, I can’t get hold of Mia. Do you know where she is?”
“No sorry, I have no idea… Why do you need her?”
“I was supposed to meet her at her flat and she’s not there. I really need to talk to her Louise.”
“Well, I’ll let her know you called if I hear from her,” Louise responded before saying good bye and hanging up. Leaving Cayd wondering where she was, worried that she’d gone running back to Eric, or worse still, worried that she’d left entirely.
“What do we do now?” Natalie asked.
“Nothing Natalie, just go home.”
“You mean go home to Sydney or home to my apartment?”
“Right now, I really don’t care Natalie,” Cayd replied stalking back to his car as he wished that he had have held back with Mia until she had sorted out everything with Natalie like he’d planned. Now, he had moved forward with her too soon, possibly ruining everything.
***
“Thanks for that. I’m just not ready to talk to him yet,” Mia said as she stood outside the security check of Melbourne’s domestic terminal entrance with Josh and Louise.
“I don’t know why you’re giving the guy a hard time Mi. He obviously cares about you. Surely there’s a good explanation for all of this,” Josh put in, as he stood holding Mia’s hastily packed bag.
“I need some time to myself alright? I have questions I need answered, I need to think, and I can’t do that here,” she stated, reaching out to take her carry on from Josh and thanking him as she did.
“Just look after yourself, and call if you need anything,” Louise said before giving her friend a hug. “Good luck and come back quickly.”
“Thanks,” Mia said before joining the line to move through the checkpoint, waving over her shoulder at Louise and Josh as they left together.
“Do you think she’s doing the right thing?” Josh asked.
“Who’s to say what’s right anymore. But she has to do whatever she thinks is best. I just hope Cayd waits for her.”
“Do you think we should tell him where she’s going?”
“We can’t, we promised.”
“This sucks,” Josh groaned, sliding his arm around Louise’s shoulders as they headed toward the car. He hated keeping secrets.
Chapter Thirty-Four
It had been over a week since Eric last saw Natalie. Even though he had strong feelings for her, he was still majorly pissed off with her for deceiving him. He’d thought about both her and Mia constantly - he missed both of them.
Mia had taken off somewhere, and no one would tell him where she was, and Natalie had kept her distance. She hadn’t even texted him. He didn’t know if she was just giving him time like he asked, or if she had changed her mind and wasn’t as in love with him as she had claimed.
Eric kicked himself constantly for thinking so much about her – he should hate her. But he didn’t, even though he couldn’t see how any sort of a relationship could work out with her.
What she did had affected everyone who was important to him. He didn’t think that he could have something with her and expect them all to be cool with it.
It was a Friday morning and Baz had once again pulled up outside the 7Eleven for their daily breakfast ritual. The moment Eric stepped through the automatic glass doors, his phone beeped a message. Immediately, he pulled it from his back pocket, swiping his thumb across the screen to read the text.
Don’t forget the sauce!
Shaking his head, Eric tapped out a reply as he walked towards the pie warmer. Come in and get it urself u lazy bastard! he told Baz, grinning to himself then pocketing his phone again as he slid out two meat pies and grabbed the requested sauce, adding the packets to the paper bags the pies were in. He then headed over to the fridges to get their milks.
His phone beeped again with another message from Baz and he attempted to balance everything in one arm to retrieve his phone from his pocket.
“Can I hold something for you?” a familiar voice said, its owner appearing in front of him.
“Natalie,” Eric breathed, almost dropping the pies and milk. “What are you doing here?”
Bouncing her shoulders, Natalie looked around briefly, “I wanted a coffee?” she attempted, her answer sounding more like question than the truth.
“At six thirty in the morning?”
“Ok, I wanted to see you,” she admitted.
“Here? Now? Couldn’t you have just called me?”
“Would you have answered?”
“Probably.”
Dropping her eyes, Natalie suddenly felt very foolish, “I didn’t think you would, you haven’t called me in over a week, so …”
“So you thought you’d stake me out?”
“No…I…I don’t know,” she admitted.
“You haven’t called me either,” he reminded her.
“I didn’t think you’d want to hear from me.”
“Seems to me Natalie, that you should be a bit more honest – say what you want instead of assuming things and getting them wrong. You could have saved us all a lot of trouble with a bit of honesty.”
“I…”
“What do you want Natalie? Why are you here?”
“For you, I want you,” she said in a rush, her heart thudding wildly in her chest.
Eric nodded his head thoughtfully, then moved straight past her and paid for the items in his hands, just as Baz hit the horn in two short bursts to tell him to hurry up.
Natalie stayed glued to the spot as she watched him move, barely breathing the entire time. After finishing at the cashier, Eric pocketed the change and picked up his items.
“Meet me at mine. I’ll be home around five,” he said as he walked by Natalie, who did little more than nod her head in response, finally breathing and actually feeling hopeful.
***
Louise worked as a graphic designer in a firm in Collingwood and most days she would meet Josh, who worked as a courier, for lunch in a little Café not far from her office. Today however, when she entered the reception area of her office she had another visitor as well.
“Cayd, how are you?” she said as she got close enough, eyeing Josh briefly to let him know that she knew this was his doing.
“I had to bring him Louise,” Josh shrugged, by way of excuse. He thought it was really silly that Mia took off without telling anyone. When he saw her and Cayd together it was really obvious they were into each other – he never could understand why women would get something in their head and go off the deep end instead of actually calmly talking about it. The female mind baffled him at times.
“Cayd, I like you. I think you’re a really great guy but, Mia is my best friend.”
“I understand Louise, really I do, but it’s been over a week. I need to straighten things out between us. It’s killing me inside to think that she’s blaming me for anything that happened,” he told her.
Louise dragged her eyes over Cayd’s beautiful face, he hadn’t shaved for possibly the entire time Mia had been gone and was sporting the beginning of what would be a very full beard. His skin looked pale and his eyes were underlined in dark shadows from his lack of sleep and his hair was dishevelled – it looked like he had spent hours raking his fingers through it.
“I’m sorry Cayd,” she said with a sigh, touching his arm gently to convey that she meant i
t.
Blowing out a breath, Cayd nodded before raising his hand to his chin. He signed ‘Please’ before pointing to his chest to sign ‘I’.
Louise’s resolve started to melt as she watched him slowly sign the sentence he had memorised, his hand sweeping down his side to sign ‘need’. He then lifted his right hand like he was catching something – ‘find’, before pointing to the side of them both – ‘her’.
Louise pressed her lips together, fully understanding how much he missed her. She could see it all over his face. “I know you want to find her, Cayd. But I promised I wouldn’t tell anyone,” she said, reaching out again and touching his arm reassuringly. “Please know that she is fine, she’s just… looking for answers – that’s all I can tell you.”
“Looking for answers?” Cayd repeated, rolling the information around in his head and on his tongue. Lowering his eyebrows, he said more to himself, “Where would she go for answers?” before it dawned on him. “She’s gone to Sydney, hasn’t she?” he asked Louise, his hands resting on her shoulders as he looked expectantly into her eyes.
“I promised I wouldn’t say Cayd,” she said with a slight laugh.
“Ah, but that isn’t a no, is it?”
“No, it’s not a no.”
“Ha!” he called out, clapping his hands together. “Thank you Louise, thank you so much,” he told her, kissing her on the cheek and giving her a quick hug.
“I didn’t breathe a word,” she reminded him.
“Of course,” he laughed, backing away from her, eager to leave so he could talk to Natalie. He was now sure that Mia had gone to see Natalie’s adoptive parents.
“Oh and Cayd!” she called out. He stopped for a moment and gave her his full attention. “Thank you for signing to me,” she both said and signed to him, smiling happily. There was something about Cayd that she really liked, perhaps it was the way Mia was around him – they seemed to fit together, and he had been nothing but kind ever since they had all met. The fact that he tried to sign for her made her like him even more and really proved to her how much he cared.
Our Hearts Entwined Page 16
